My garden makes me so happy

[HumphreyCobbler]

I wanted a garden all my adult life, and for the last three years I have had one.

To begin with I was worried it wouldn't be as much fun as I thought it would be, but I soon discovered it was even better.

It was an overgrown, tangled mess when we moved in and slowly we have transformed it. I am still a beginner, but I already know so much more than I did.

Today I came home to find a massive pile of well rotted horseshit waiting for me. It was brilliant.

I don't really know what the point of this post is, I just wanted to share

[ChristinedePizan]

This isn't what I was thinking of but what about a crab apple? Really lovely blossom and then nice red fruit in autumn. Obviously a bit dull in winter but you could put some solar fairy lights or baubles on it :o

[ComeIntoTheGardenMaud]

Yes, I think crab apple will be my fall-back option. I was just hoping for something a little more left-field. Mind you, I'm still trying not to weep at the revelation that Humphrey's rose walk is longer than my garden.

::sob::

[HumphreyCobbler]

don't worry, I bet your house is a LOT bigger. This is the price we paid for a large garden..

Crab apples are lovely, I don't have any at the moment but they are quite easy to grow I gather?

I am going out today to plant up some ornamental poppy seeds ready for next year. I am deeply impressed with myself for adapting to the long term time scale, it makes me feel like a proper gardener.

What are you all up to in your gardens today? I bet you are already out in them

[HumphreyCobbler]

that is ME who is lazy btw

[ComeIntoTheGardenMaud]

I've just come in as it was starting to rain. Boo. Today or tomorrow I shall be sowing some seeds - mostly ornamentals to fill gaps in the beds here or to go into my cutting garden ::ultra-ponce:: on the allotment. I have lots of poppy seeds from the 99p store a popular local garden centre and will have a rummage through what's left over from last year's excessive seed-buying. I will buy some chocolate cosmos this afternoon.

Our house is big enough but that's not the point. I waaaaant a huge garden so that I can ponce about all summer with a trug fulfil my gardening ambitions.

[ComeIntoTheGardenMaud]

Oh and Malus John Dowie is the crab apple that everyone seems to recommend.

[HumphreyCobbler]

that should of course say ORIENTAL poppy, not ornamental

my children are proving too annoying to permit any actual gardening although it is not raining here yet.

[ComeIntoTheGardenMaud]

Can't you enlist the children in the gardening?

[TaffetaCat]

Its raining here but before it rained I put a cloche over some early peas I sowed earlier in the week.

We have John Dowie, its taking a while to get going ( had it 3 years ) but then we do have crap soil.

What I really want is an almond, but I think it needs a deep root run and as we are on solid chalk about a foot down, its tough to get trees established.

My DD was supposed to be sowing peas and marigolds in her patch today, hopefully the weather will be better tomorrow.....

[IlsaLund]

I'm just heading out - the weather is glorius here. I'm going to clean and tidy the greenhouse and potting shed and hopefully do some planting.

I also need to do some serious weeding in my flower beds. They are looking especially bad as we have just aquired a very large breed 2 year old dog who cannot distinguish between lawn and flower bed and she has been charging across them

[foxinsocks]

I love gardening too. I get an enormous amount of pleasure out of it.

Sadly we can't afford a house with a garden but we have a yard (about 20 ft by 12 ft) and a small bit in front of the house.

Everything I grow is in pots apart from a few soil patches in corner of the back garden.

Would be interested in hearing of any great pot successes! My olive tree was doing very well but the builders destroyed it so I'm thinking of asking the dcs to get me a new one for my birthday!

I have some Rose trees in pots but not quite sure how I should prune those!

[foxinsocks]

All the magnolias are out here and just beautiful!

[HumphreyCobbler]

my children are four and two, I made the mistake of casually picking off a bit of dead stuff in front of the two year old the other day. I now spend all day stopping her from doing the same

They DO like helping, it is just that DH has had them out in the garden all week with him and I think they are a bit sick of it.

It has gone really cold here. Am off to the garden centre for some herbs now

[TaffetaCat]

fox - my biggest pot successes are two azaleas and a veronica gentianodes which is one of my favourite plants. I grew 10 from seed about 5 years ago, the 9 in the ground have died but the one in a big pot comes back each year and lifts my heart!

I empathise Humphrey. Mine are 7 and 4. The 4 yo makes potions with various plants, seems to have finally got the message about not picking flowers, and the 7 yo is only very slightly interested in his own patch. School has a gardening club but neither want to join.

[foxinsocks]

Oh taffeta, it sounds lovely! I shall look out for one.

My dcs are 9 and 10 and do appreciate flowers/gardens but probably wouldn't spend an afternoon weeding or planting unless bribed . Both will grow things individually though- ds grows tomatoes in pots (instant gratification good for boys I find) and dd loves cacti (strangely I did at her age too).

I feel v inspired by this thread!

[foxinsocks]

Have just looked up that Veronica - what a beautiful colour flower

[OhYouBadBadKitten]

What a lovely thread :)

I adore my garden too. Little things like spotting the first ladybird have made me very happy this week. It is where I go when I need to think/relax/de-stress.

[ComeIntoTheGardenMaud]

Ladies - Hot news from Lidl's gardening event. I have just bought two nice geraniums, Brookside (never heard of it, but blue) and Ballerina for the grand price of £1.99 the pair.

Fox - Agapanthus are better in pots than in the ground. I had a minaret apple tree in a pot for years and have a bay tree doing great stuff at the moment. Are you looking for permanent plantings or things you can chuck out at the end of the season?

[foxinsocks]

Hi Maud - I have space for about 2 or 3 more pots in addition to the roses. Am definitely getting another olive tree as the first one was so blissfully happy. Was thinking a blueberry bush for one other and then a flowering plant for the last. I actually didn't realise agapanthas were happy in our weather!

I love agapanthas. I spent many years living in S Africa and they grow everywhere there. Also birds of paradise (Strelitzias) - my favourite flowers. Not sure they'd fare well in our climate though!

[ComeIntoTheGardenMaud]

Hi again, Fox. I admit I'm surprised, but it looks as if all my pots of agapanthus have got through the long cold winter. I love strelitzia but have never managed to keep one alive.

One of these days, I would love to go on one of the plant safaris to South Africa that are advertised in the RHS magazine.

[HumphreyCobbler]

ComeIntoTheGardenMaud - how big are your agapanthus pots? How many plants do you put in per pot?

[HumphreyCobbler]

I also meant to say that I have broccoli - lots of purple flowers have arrived.

I am also eating sorrell that has self seeded, it is great.

[IlsaLund]

I love broccoli but I've never had any success with it.

I spent a few hours in the garden today. Unfortunatley I am easily distracted and didn't do anything I had planned.

I have weeded a small portion of flowerbed - before I could have described it as being underplanted with creeping buttercup, couch grass and groundelder but its looking a little bit better and I'm hoping the Oriental Poppies will now flourish.

We have builders working on our outbuilidngs and today I realised they have piled loads of old timber and offcuts on top of my paeony bed

Tomorrow come hell or high water I'm going to plant some spinach

[ComeIntoTheGardenMaud]

Humphrey - My biggest agapanthus pot is about 16" across and is chock a block with agapanthus. It's been going for so long that I can't remember how many plants I put in it, but they were offcuts from someone else's plants so weren't the little clumps that you buy in garden centres anyway. The other pots are much smaller and it's really those that I'm surprised survived the frost, as every part of the pot and plant must have been frozen. Looking at the agapanthus that was part of a mixed planting, I think it's doubled in size in a year so if I was starting a new pot now I'd aim to fill half the space with actual plant, I think, so that it was full next year.

Is everyone here a member of a local gardening society? Mine has been fantastic as a source of advice and bargain plants from plant sales.

[ComeIntoTheGardenMaud]

::snort:: of recognition at underplanted with creeping buttercup. Have just bought a super-duper new daisy grubber for yanking it out of the manky patch of tatty grass the lawn.